¹⁹ My wound is severe,
    and my grief is great.
My sickness is incurable,
    but I must bear it.

⁹ I will be patient as the Lord punishes me,
    for I have sinned against him.
But after that, he will take up my case
    and give me justice for all I have suffered from my enemies.
The Lord will bring me into the light,
    and I will see his righteousness.

³⁹ Then why should we, mere humans, complain
    when we are punished for our sins?

⁴⁰ Instead, let us test and examine our ways.
    Let us turn back to the Lord.

“Night and day my eyes overflow with tears.
    I cannot stop weeping,
for my virgin daughter—my precious people—
    has been struck down
    and lies mortally wounded.

³¹ I hear a cry, like that of a woman in labor,
    the groans of a woman giving birth to her first child.
It is beautiful Jerusalem^[a]
    gasping for breath and crying out,
    “Help! I’m being murdered!”

⁹ I am silent before you; I won’t say a word,
    for my punishment is from you.

⁴⁸ Tears stream from my eyes
    because of the destruction of my people!

¹⁸ I cry out, “My splendor is gone!
    Everything I had hoped for from the Lord is lost!”

¹⁹ The thought of my suffering and homelessness
    is bitter beyond words.^[a]
20 I will never forget this awful time,
    as I grieve over my loss.
²¹ Yet I still dare to hope
    when I remember this:

¹¹ I have cried until the tears no longer come;
    my heart is broken.
My spirit is poured out in agony
    as I see the desperate plight of my people.
Little children and tiny babies
    are fainting and dying in the streets.

¹² They cry out to their mothers,
    “We need food and drink!”
Their lives ebb away in the streets
    like the life of a warrior wounded in battle.
They gasp for life
    as they collapse in their mothers’ arms.

¹³ What can I say about you?
    Who has ever seen such sorrow?
O daughter of Jerusalem,
    to what can I compare your anguish?
O virgin daughter of Zion,
    how can I comfort you?
For your wound is as deep as the sea.
    Who can heal you?

¹⁴ Your prophets have said
    so many foolish things, false to the core.
They did not save you from exile
    by pointing out your sins.
Instead, they painted false pictures,
    filling you with false hope.

¹⁵ All who pass by jeer at you.
    They scoff and insult beautiful Jerusalem,^[a] saying,
“Is this the city called ‘Most Beautiful in All the World’
    and ‘Joy of All the Earth’?”

¹⁶ All your enemies mock you.
    They scoff and snarl and say,
“We have destroyed her at last!
    We have long waited for this day,
    and it is finally here!”

¹⁷ But it is the Lord who did just as he planned.
    He has fulfilled the promises of disaster
    he made long ago.
He has destroyed Jerusalem without mercy.
    He has caused her enemies to gloat over her
    and has given them power over her.

¹⁸ Cry aloud^[b] before the Lord,
    O walls of beautiful Jerusalem!
Let your tears flow like a river
    day and night.
Give yourselves no rest;
    give your eyes no relief.

¹⁹ Rise during the night and cry out.
    Pour out your hearts like water to the Lord.
Lift up your hands to him in prayer,
    pleading for your children,
for in every street
    they are faint with hunger.

²⁰ “O Lord, think about this!
    Should you treat your own people this way?
Should mothers eat their own children,
    those they once bounced on their knees?
Should priests and prophets be killed
    within the Lord’s Temple?

²¹ “See them lying in the streets—
    young and old,
boys and girls,
    killed by the swords of the enemy.
You have killed them in your anger,
    slaughtering them without mercy.

²² “You have invited terrors from all around,
    as though you were calling them to a day of feasting.
In the day of the Lord’s anger,
    no one has escaped or survived.
The enemy has killed all the children
    whom I carried and raised.”